


In Dreams They Come, Again (the dead)

by jesseofthenorth



Category: Avengers (Comic), Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Angst, Community: hc_bingo, Dreams, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Team Dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-28
Updated: 2012-02-28
Packaged: 2017-10-31 20:51:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/348252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jesseofthenorth/pseuds/jesseofthenorth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint Barton is not superhuman, but he might be hungover</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Dreams They Come, Again (the dead)

**Author's Note:**

> Written for hc_bingo's February Amnesty Challenge Postage Stamp prompts: Orphans, Loss of Voice, Headaches/Migraines and Wild Card for which I used 'Fever/Delirium'.
> 
> I meant for this to be funnier and about a thousand words long. Sorry it's not funny(er) but I can't really find it in my heart to apologize for getting more words out :D Also after the amount of slash I have inhaled in this fandom I am SHOCKED that this Gen. SHOCKED I tell you. Oh well maybe next time
> 
> Thanks to shinysylver for the beta and comma wrangling!

There had been plenty of times in the last couple of months when Clint wondered what the hell he was even doing working with these people. He knew he didn't really belong here, wasn't really one of them. He was just an available SHEILD agent with a useful skill. As far as Clint could tell he was here by default.

But, working with a team of superheroes was pretty cool. The trouble they found themselves in could be a lot of fun, right up until the moment when you got humiliatingly reminded that you might get to play hero but you were not in fact 'super.'

Getting knocked on his ass by a cold drove the point home for Clint Barton.

He was beat to hell from the teams run-in with the baddie of the week. Bruised and cut and feeling like hammered crap, that of course was when he got sick. No one else, just Clint.

Thor was never sick or even wounded and could count on one hand the number of times he had been knocked off his feet by anything.

Hulk had a healing factor that was legendary even in the superhero community.

Cap was damned near indestructible and even when he got hurt he was back on his feet in no time and he _never_ got sick.

Stark, the bastard, was completely human, but still never got sick unless it was catastrophically and in spectacular fashion. No simple colds for Ironman.

Black Widow had been injured, but never bitched about it and there wasn't a germ on the planet with the balls to fuck with Natasha Romanov.

Even Agent Coulson never got sick, which made sense because Clint was half convinced Coulson was robot any way.

All of which was just fucking peachy. Clint was happy for his team-mates, really, except for the fact that he was dying of the damned plague and he hated them all.

It started on a Monday. Of course. Fucking Mondays.

He dragged his ass out of bed late, but it wasn't the first time, Clint wasn't exactly in love with mornings. He had just enough time to make it in for the briefing.

Rolling out of bed a little late usually wasn't an issue except that he seemed to have over done it a bit the night before. Clint had spent the previous evening getting _intimately_ acquainted with a bottle of tequila and _briefly_ acquainted with a very flexible young lady named Nora who had a lot of energy.

Clint had meant to head back to the mansion last night, but by the time he and the lady in question parted company it was too late to be bothered, not when he was too far past pleasantly numb. Clint had only just made it back to his shitty apartment before passing out.

It should have been no problem, it wasn't the first time he'd stayed out past his bed time. Except for how it was twenty minutes before a meeting at SHIELD and he still hadn't had coffee and he felt like shit even after a shower. He barely had time to make it. The last thing Clint needed right now was Coulson chewing on his ass for missing a briefing.

Good damn thing Clint had a stupidly fast bike, and knew how to drive it. So what if Clint scared the shit out of a couple of tourists on the way in, and he barely remembered the ride. There was coffee when he got there and he wasn't late.

"Good of you to join us, Mr. Barton," was all the greeting he got from Fury.

Clint slouched in his chair, same as always, but the headache slamming against the inside of his skull made it hard to follow what was going on. Planning an op could be tedious but planning kept people from dying. Sitting here going over the same shit a million times was never his favorite thing, but it was part of the job and Clint did it. Especially now that he was part of a team. They depended on him to have his shit together.

At least the Avengers usually made this crap a little interesting.

Except today it was all just noise and blah blah blah, and it went on and on and on. His head was pounding and his throat was sore like he'd been screaming or puking all night. Speaking of puking, his gut was rocking and rolling and for a second he was right on the edge of losing the coffee he'd drunk.

“Fuck” Clint muttered. Only maybe muttered wasn't entirely accurate. Since everyone at the table turned and looked at him.

“Something you'd like to add, Mr. Barton?” Fury asked, eye brow arched, his mouth a grim annoyed line.

“No, sir,” Clint croaked and fuck if he didn't sound like shit.

“Rough night?” Stark smirked at him and Clint kind of wanted to punch Stark right in his smug face. It wasn't as if Stark had never shown up at a meeting hung-over.

“No!” Clint's response didn't really have a lot of credibility when it came out on a gravelly croak.

Stark smirked at him some more, Fury gave him the eyebrow, Coulson stared and Cap looked worried. Clint slouched even further down in his chair, and tried to ignore them all.

He didn't realize he had been sitting there in an semi-absent fog until Natasha poked him in the ribs with her elbow and hissed, “Meeting's over jack-ass.”

Clint looked around and saw he was the only one still sitting at the table. Everyone else was making their way out. He didn't remember a single word from the briefing. Shit.

“Barton?”

Coulson was standing by his chair looking vaguely displeased.

“Sir,” Clint said and got to his feet. Only sort of... not. Because it turned out his legs weren't really working all that great which was actually fine because he was dizzy as fuck and standing was not a good idea. At all.

So he sat back down. Hard. On the floor.

He jaw snapped shut at the impact and the bolt of pain that shot through his head made the whole room white out for a bit.

It occurred to him fuzzily that this didn't actually feel much like a hang-over. He realized vaguely that every bone in his body was aching right along with his head.

“Hey.” Coulson sounded mildly concerned which was actually worrying. Coulson never sounded like much of anything nevermind concerned.

Clint leaned forward meaning to get up off the damned floor. The lurch forward made his gut roll alarmingly and he couldn't really help the groan that slipped out. Clint fucking hated puking but damn he was close to it. He swallowed convulsively trying to hang on.

“You gonna lose it?” Coulson asked quietly, suddenly closer, leaning over him with a hand on Clint's back.

Clint meant to say, 'fuck no!' but what came out instead was a breathy squeak with no real sound behind it.

He tried again to get to his feet. Suddenly, another hand was pressing firmly but gently on his shoulder and Cap's voice was telling him. “Stay down, Hawkeye.”

And you know what? That sounded like a really good idea and for a change Clint did what he was told.

After that, shit got a little hard to follow.

He remembered walking, or okay maybe it was more like mostly being carried by Cap and Thor, to the infirmary.

There was a gurney and a doctor with a really cold stethoscope. He tried telling the doc he was fine but he couldn't make any sound come out except this feeble sounding whisper that was worse than nothing. After that he mostly gave up and let stuff happen around him.

There was a pinch in Clint's arm and then shit got _really_ hazy before the light just kind of slipped out of everything.

 

He surfaced a while later and realized dimly that he was on a hospital bed with an IV and fuck if he wasn't wearing one of those stupid paper gown things. If he didn't feel so much like reheated shit he'd bitch about it. Except he couldn't really make any sound and there was no one there to hear anyway.

“Screw it,” he thought and let himself pass the fuck out.

 

Clint partially surfaced again to the sound of Fury's annoyed voice.

“So he's not actually gonna die?”

“No, sir”

“Fan-fucking-tastic. I'm holding you to that, so see that he doesn't. Too god-damned expensive to replace.”

Clint slipped back under wondering how expensive.

 

He slept. His fever spiked and he dreamed (remembered).

 

Clint watched his younger self sitting in a hard backed chair waiting. He knew this was a dream and he knew this room and the fear it once held. The fear of losing what little he had left in the wake of his parent's deaths.  
Clint felt the weight of his big brother's hand on his arm squeezing gently. “It'll be okay kid. We'll stick together and it'll be okay.”

Sitting there waiting to find out what would happen to them now that they had only each other, Clint looked at his brother's red eyes. He remembered thinking Barney was the only thing he had left. That childish faith that had held on so long, that he and Barney would be together forever.

But then it all changed in an instant and he was standing in the dust years later watching the back of his brother's head fade away on a bus. Clint called after him but he had no voice and Barney never looked back. Clint had never felt more desperate and alone.

“Barney,” Clint gasped and lurched forward snapping himself out of the dream into a confused wakefulness. Instead of standing in an empty street he was in a darkened room, a strong hand holding him down.

“Easy Clint. You're dreaming,” a familiar voice told him.

“Barney?” he groaned knowing it couldn't be, but wanting it all the same.

“It's Steve. You were dreaming, Clint.”

The familiar face moved into his line of sight. Clint could barely nod his understanding. His head was pounding and everything hurt and his throat was as dry and raw as the rocky dirt of that long ago street.

Clint swallowed trying to make his voice work.

“Do you need water?” Cap asked gently, holding a straw to Clint's lips and keeping it steady while Clint drank.

The first swallow was heaven and he felt the dry, parched surfaces soak it up. A moment later it hit his stomach and the cold water made his gut clench, everything tilted and suddenly the water came right back up again.

“Damn,” Steve said and rolled Clint gently onto his side so he could spit. A flush of heat and embarrassment washed over Clint and he turned his head away closing his eyes. It was only a second or two before he was under again.

 

He drifted through a darkened landscape for what felt like years. The darkness lit only by light reflected off the faces of people who had been and were now gone. His poor ignorant mother who did the best she could with what she had. He didn't know her voice but he remembered the sound of her crying.

His brother. Always the stronger one, the protector and defender and provider until one day he wasn't anymore. Clint saw Barney's face scarred by betrayal, made ugly by anger and hatred. Barney faded away still looking at Clint, his face twisted as it moved into the darkness that surrounded them, before disappearing completely.

Clint saw the faces of neglect and cruelty and greed that marked his childhood, each one feared or loved but all remembered. They followed and then chased him, and when the fear was too much Clint tried to call out for help but he had no voice, only a breathy whisper that would bring no help.

 

Clint surfaced for a while to a cool touch on his forehead. A pretty woman in nurses scrubs wiping his face “It's okay honey you're just dreaming.”

He tried to tell her otherwise that it had all happened, was still happening, but he had no voice and could not correct her.

Clint drifted and let the relief of that cool touch carry him. Then he was alone again.

 

He drifted out then back in again again. The room was still dim and Clint wondered how much time could have really passed if it was still night. It didn't matter, or if it did he couldn't make himself care. Clint was tired and felt like shit. He closed his eyes and slept.

 

He woke again to the sound of a voice reciting. Or extolling. The perfect measured pitch soothing him without sending him back to sleep. Clint listened for a moment trying to make sense of the words

“-so does the poet tell the tale of Beowulf, of all the kings upon the earth he was the man most gracious.”

It was Thor reciting some impossibly long _thing_ that probably never would make sense to Clint.

“Water?” he tried to say. The sound he made instead was breathless and without force but Thor immediately stopped talking and moved closer.

“Clint Barton, you are awake! What say you? Are you improved, my brother?”

“Not brother,” Clint whispered and closed his eyes, seeing again the betrayal of his dreams.

“Drink, Clint Barton. It will revive you.” Thor pressed a straw, held very carefully, to his lips and Clint did as he was told. The water was salty and bitter and didn't taste right but he swallowed it anyway. His throat was so parched he didn't care if it made him barf again. Anything was better than his swollen tongue and the sharp pain in his throat.

Clint closed his eyes and turned away after only a few swallows. This time his stomach didn't rebel but the effort of swallowing had exhausted him.

“Rest, my brother. I will tell you more of the warrior and Grendel,” Thor said and put his hand on Clint's shoulder offering strength and support.

Clint slipped back into sleep, or unconsciousness, to soothing words that made no sense, and the hand of a friend grounding him even as he slipped away.

 

This time Clint didn't dream.

 

When he surfaced again it was actual waking up up instead drifting toward consciousness.

He took a minute to appreciate the difference. He still felt like shit, but... better. He was tired and his throat still hurt, but the fog that he had been drifting in for the last however long was gone.

He was also wearing clothes. Sort of. He had graduated from a paper _gown_ to one of those humiliating open backed things. At least this one was made from actual cloth.

The room was brighter. Natasha was sitting in a chair beside his bed staring at him without blinking.

“You're not dead,” she said as if there had been some question at one point.

“Apparently.” he tried to say, and was mildly thrilled to discover it came close to legible speech. There was at least some sound.

“Water?” he asked and Natasha rolled her eyes before standing up to fill a glass from the pitcher by his bed.

She handed it to him. When he almost fumbled it she lifted one finely sculpted eyebrow and put a single finger under the cup while he held on. It was enough help to get him a swallow or two without taking an impromptu bath.

“You missed the op.”

Clint looked at her confused for a second before catching up. “We get him?”

She nodded.

“Good” he said and laid back, closing his eyes.

 

When he opened them again she was gone and a nurse was there.

“So Mr Barton. You 're back with us?” It was half question and half statement. Clint figured he was safe to just nod.

“When can I get out of here?” he asked as she fussed around with his IV and checked his pulse.

“Probably sometime after you have more color than the walls,” Coulson said from the doorway.

The nurse nodded her agreement and went on her way.

“Sir.”

“Barton. You sticking with us for a bit? Or are you going to faint again?”

“Uh- sticking around? And I didn't _faint_ , Sir. I passed out.”

Coulson just shrugged clearly not seeing the difference.

“Whatever the case, next time could you maybe seek medical attention before you fall over at a meeting?”

“It was actually after the meeting,Sir.” Clint felt compelled to point out.

Coulson stared at him stone faced for a moment. “Don't do it again, Barton. The reports are in triplicate when that happens.” He looked at Clint for another second or two and sat down.

Clint went back to sleep.

 

Clint was given a weeks unattached leave to recuperate from what turned out to be a bad flu that only he got. He wasn't sure he would ever recover from the humiliation of ending up in the hospital from a glorified cold.

He spent his leave at the Mansion. Not for any other reason than the fact that there was usually someone around he could weasel into bringing him a drink or making him a sandwich, if he was persistent enough. It had nothing to do with the fact that his shitty, run down, _empty_ apartment was sometimes heavily populated with ghosts.

It felt weird at first being around the Avengers 24/7. Yeah, he worked with them all and he knew them (sort of) but they where a lot to process all together all of the time. Everything about every one of them was so... big, and loud, and just really a lot. And Clint was just a guy with good aim. Being a normal guy on a superhero team kind of sucked.

Except for the part where those same superheroes had never once left him alone when he was at SHEILD Medical, without being asked and asked nothing in return, as if it was a given that they would be there.

Clint remembered being in Medical surrounded by ghosts every time he closed his eyes, only to find one or another of the Avengers watching over him when he opened them. It didn't make him feel safe exactly, just.... less alone. It was weird, but good, Clint decided he could take that at face value. Maybe he didn't actually mind being on a team of superheroes so much, after all. Even if he was just a guy.


End file.
